


Got A Lump In My Throat 'Cause You're Gonna Sing The Words Wrong

by ellatrobbie



Category: NCIS: Los Angeles
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, I guess but not really, um well, weird end of season 4 feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-20
Updated: 2013-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-05 06:36:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1090772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellatrobbie/pseuds/ellatrobbie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"She’s pretty sure they hadn’t made plans. And even though a lot of their hang-outs aren’t necessarily scheduled, he usually calls her before dropping by." Post-ep 4x22.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Got A Lump In My Throat 'Cause You're Gonna Sing The Words Wrong

**Author's Note:**

> Something that popped into my head, perhaps to relieve my heart of the current Densi feels. Although it's not really much happier? Idk. 
> 
> Title from "Riptide" by Vance Joy which is pretty high on my Kensi and Deeks playlist and it's lovely. 
> 
> Obviously minimal editing has been done, so apologies for the roughness!
> 
> Hope you like it :)

It’s nearly midnight when someone knocks on her door. She frowns; she was just about to take a long hot shower and then crash into bed. And who the Hell would be knocking now?

Cautiously peering through the peephole, she sees Deeks. She’s pretty sure they hadn’t made plans. And even though a lot of their hang outs aren’t necessarily scheduled, he usually calls her before dropping by. His head is down, but he keeps glancing up at the door while he waits for her to answer. He’s got this look on his face... well she can’t place it. If she didn’t know any better she’d say he was nervous. 

She opens the door finally, “Deeks?”

“Hey,” Deeks says. She looks at him and it takes him a moment to register she’s waiting for him to continue. “Sorry to, uh, – I wanted to give you this.” He reaches out and only then does she’s notice he’s holding something. A thumbdrive. 

“What is it?” She stares at the thumbdrive suspiciously. 

“It’s a peace offering,” he grins. And finally, finally, looks like himself again. 

“Uh huh,” she shifts her gaze to him, waiting until he crumbles. 

“Okay,” he sighs, but there’s still a lick of a smile on his lips, “it’s more like a pleading bribe. I give you this and you say nothing about my band to Starsky and Hutch. Or the Wonder Twins.”

She’s tempted, definitely. But cautious. “How can I know it’s worth the deal?” She asks, biting her lip thoughtfully. 

He breaks out into a grin again, and shakes his head, “Trust me. Besides, I’m smart enough to know not to try and pull one over on you.” 

She grins back at him, not sure if it’s at the compliment or the fact that she can’t look at him smiling for too long without smiling back. She tries not to think about either. He waves his outstretched hand a little until she caves and takes the drive. 

“This better be worth it,” she warns with a playful glare. She steps a little to the left, leaning against her open door. “You wanna come in for a beer? We can, uh, look at this together.”

His gaze drops to his feet for a second, before lifting back up to look at her. It was fast, almost meaningless. But lately she’s been feeling as though every random gesture is filled with something more.  
“No, uh, actually I’m feeling quite tired from all the mopping and the janitoring I’ve had to do so...”

“Janitoring?” she interrupts him, raising an eyebrow. 

He smiles, but it’s not like before. Almost apologetic. He mouths moves slightly, like he wants to say something else but he’s not and her heart drops. How can he make her go from happy to wanting to punch him in a couple of seconds?! And _why_ does he have to make everything so difficult?

“Deeks?” She says suddenly, breaking the silence before she breaks his nose. 

“Yeah?” 

“I’ll see you tomorrow. If you’re lucky, your secret will be safe,” She grins and waves the drive he’s given her. 

His smiles widens, although it still doesn’t meet his eyes and she hates herself for knowing the difference. “I trust you, Fern,” he says before giving her a weak salute and turning around. She watches him get all the way to his car before she closes her front door, feeling angry and intrigued at the same time. She really needs that shower. 

\----------------------------------------

She’s in her PJs, plaiting her hair before bed as she walks through the living room to turn off the light. The CD is still on her coffee table where she left it. She sighs, and picks it up, moving to the table where her laptop is sitting.  
There’s only one file on the drive, a video file. She thinks for a moment that this is some stupid joke and that the file is something filthy he had stumbled upon. But she thinks back to his smile, worried and cautious, and clicks on the file. She bites her lip as the camera takes a while to focus. Whoever is filming this has annoyingly shaky hands. 

And there he is. Her eyes widen and she can’t help from smiling. Deeks at 15, his blonde shaggy mop looks almost identical to what it does now, although it looks even brighter from the light right above his head. He’s skinny, but not small. They’re in some sort of garage; Kensi spots tools on one of the walls. There are three other guys, two on either side of him and one behind them sitting by the most pathetic drum kit she’d ever seen. They’re all wearing matching T-shirts – the one she’d used to clean her gun this morning and she feels a pang of guilt. The camera zooms shakily onto Deeks’ face, he’s biting his lip as he tries to tune his guitar. It looks quite old, and she imagines it’s second-hand from some pawn shop, that he had to work all summer to afford it. 

The camera zooms out to fit the rest of the band in shot just as Deeks look up and straight into the camera. He grins, and shakes his hair out of his eyes. “Thank you for coming to our show!” He says loudly, his voice sounding so different than it does now. She can’t help but laugh at it for a moment, almost missing what he’s saying. “We are Touching Wood and this is a song we wrote,” he says, and he’s practically beaming. 

They wrote songs too? Oh she’s going to have fun with Deeks tomorrow. 

“1, 2, 1, 2, 3-” the drummer counts them in and then the room is filled with guitars and bass and beats. 

“Oh girl I see you smiling like you do...” Deeks starts singing, and her mouth falls open a little bit. He’s actually good. She tries to imagine him singing now, his voice much deeper and – oh she’s definitely going to figure out how to get him to sing for her properly one day. They don’t have microphones, but somehow Deeks voice stays above the music, which isn’t too bad either. Deeks definitely knew what he was doing with a guitar. 

The lyrics are fantastically cheesy, and she’s pretty sure they stole the melody from a song she’s heard before. Whoever was filming keeps playing with the zoom and must have been there for Deeks because most of the focus is on him. Not that she minded. He was grinning throughout the whole song, obviously feeling cool doing it. But also like he was just happy to be there. She imagines herself at the same age, imagines herself going to school with Deeks, seeing him in the hallways. She can see why he would have been super popular at school. And she cheeks grow hot when she thinks she probably could have had a crush on him then. Thank God she was watching this alone. 

By the time she shakes the thought out of her head and gets back to the video, the song is nearly over. It ends with an impressive high note – he’s seriously good. And then the dozen or so audience members in the garage burst into applause. The band bows, and Deeks laughs loudly as he gives the camera a thumbs up. There’s still another minute or so of the recording, even though the song is over, so Kensi keeps watching. It’s extra shaky for a bit as whoever is filming, seems to have forgotten about it, but when it straightens out, 15-year old Deeks is walking straight towards her. 

“Mom, are you still filming?” he asks, shaking his head. Kensi’s thoughts still. His mom. Of course. She knows what she looked like – Deeks has a picture of her in his living room. But this, this is different. 

“Oh honey, I’m so proud of you! You were wonderful!” a woman’s voice finally comes from behind the camera. The screen goes black as she gives Deeks a hug. 

“Yeah?” she can hear him say. 

“I’m so glad I recorded it!” his mom says, “You wanna wave one more time before I turn it off?”

The screen straightens and focuses on his face. Deeks – although it’s not Deeks. Not like she knows him. 15 year old Marty grins, smooth-skinned and baby-faced, flashes all his teeth and waves to the camera. And then it ends. 

Kensi stares at the black screen for a moment. She imagines Deeks, transferring all his tapes onto CDs after his mother died. Deeks doesn’t talk about his childhood. She knows some snippets, but most of those didn’t come willingly. What Deeks shares is either embellished or something he’s proud of. And she realises now, that he could’ve made anything up about that T-shirt but he told her about the band. And now she sees why. 

And she feels really guilty about the T-shirt, damnit. 

She closes the laptop and goes straight to bed. If she dreams about being back in high school, watching a 15 year old Marty Deeks across the hallway, she’ll deny it. If she dreams that he winks at her and she wakes up blushing, she’ll take that to her grave. 

\--------------------------------------------

She decides she isn’t going to say anything. Mostly because she can’t come up with anything to say. Teasing him feels wrong, for once and she can’t imagine he wants to rehash his past with her. She’ll buy him coffee, laugh at his jokes and they’ll go back to normal. Maybe they’ll even be able to get past this weirdness they’ve been having. Hopefully.

But Deeks is late to work. Well, she assumes he’s late until Granger pops by offering yet another terrible excuse as to why Deeks will be away for a while. 

She takes a moment, stares at her desk, furious. Betrayed. Why couldn’t he have at least told her he had to go undercover again? She’s an agent, she understands classified cases. She doesn’t need details. But she does deserve to be warned if her partner isn’t going to show up for work, let alone if he might be doing something dangerous. God, doesn’t he trust - 

Last night comes back to her in flashes. His face, his sheepish smile, his words seared into her memory. It made sense now, all of it and the weight of it clicking together made her feel like she couldn’t get out of her chair even if she wanted to. He trusted her. He told her in the only way that he could. She just didn’t see it.


End file.
